


Night, Pa.

by hannah1607



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Minor Character Death, One Big Happy Family, Post-Video Game: Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018), Pregnancy, Red Dead Redemption 2 Spoilers, Till I ruin it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 00:00:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29849490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannah1607/pseuds/hannah1607
Summary: A short story detailing the very short life of John Marston and Abigail Marston's daughter. I was so sad that while she was mentioned briefly in Red Dead Redemption, she didn't make an appearance (even as a little bump) in RDR2.
Relationships: Abigail Roberts Marston/John Marston
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	1. Creation

He can tell something is bothering her, from the way she distances herself from him, from the way she doesn’t quite listen to what Jack is reading in the evening and from the way Uncle’s grumbles about the stew don’t seem to reach her ears. Usually she would snap at Uncle, but tonight she is too withdrawn and in thought to really notice anything around her. Abigail barely says a word to him all evening, after dinner she gets up and takes the plates from the table. The warm summer air is gradually cooling outside, he and Uncle sit on the porch, he smokes a cigarette and Uncle sucks on a pipe. 

‘What’s wrong with Abigail?’ Uncle asks.

‘Nothing… or at least nothing as far as I know,’ John replies. 

‘She’s been actin’ oddly these past days.’

‘I’m surprised you’ve noticed.’

‘Your ‘er husband, I’m surprised you haven’t.’

He flicked away the remnants of the cigarette, got up and dusted himself off, then headed back inside. Usually if something is bothering Abigail, she’ll lay into him like no other. Letting him know her displeasure has never been something she holds her tongue on. He finds her in their room, sat on the bed and holding a hairbrush in one hand. But she gazes off and only startles when he closes the door behind him. She nervously begins to brush her hair again, avoiding looking at him, until he curls his hand round her own and her mouth drops open. He carefully takes the brush from her hand, and carefully begins brushing through the dark, curls. Her mouth quirks up into a small smile.

‘You’ve never brushed my hair before,’ she said.

‘Well, I’ve never known my wife to keep what’s bothering her to herself,’ the brush glides through Abigail’s dark, chestnut curls. ‘Usually I’m the first to know,’ he mutters and sees her hide her smile. 

‘There’s just a lot on my mind,’ Abigail says.

‘Oh, like what?’ 

‘Just whether we should send Jack to a proper school and whether Uncle will actually do any work tomorrow.’

‘Well with Uncle being so unwilling to do a half day’s decent work, I do need Jack around, but maybe we can…’

She sighs suddenly, though he can’t quite tell whether it’s from frustration or a different emotion, and turns round to face him. She purses her lips and he wonders if she’s getting ready to berate him for something. She looks up to his face, then down at her hands, then back up at his face. 

It’s as though she’s made a decision, because she finally says, ‘I’m pregnant… again.’ 

He sits back, the brush still held in his hand, and nods slowly. Well given that he and Abigail had very much taken advantage of their newly wed status to enjoy the pleasures of married life, he couldn’t say he was too surprised. Though the news still hit him like a frying pan to the face. He spins the brush between his fingers and looked up to Abigail, who is kneeling nervously at the end of the bed. She tilts her head slightly, trying to read him.

‘Well?’ she asked. There was a glimmer of hope in her eyes, but he could see well enough that she waiting for him to do what he had done before, run from the room, mount his horse and head out. He knew there was something of the temptation there, but more because he didn’t want a repeat of his experience of fatherhood. Which was pretty daft when he thought about it, running from Jack and Abigail had led to a frosty relationship with both. Abigail had, more or less, forgiven him, but Jack had kept his distance and hadn’t seen him anything more than one of his many Uncles who hung around the camp. They had become father and son slowly, building that relationship brick by painful brick. Even now their conversations were occasionally stilted and awkward.

He nodded slowly again, ‘I guess we’ll need a crib then.’

Abigail’s excited smile was delicious and welcome, she looked like she would bounce over to him, but she restrained herself, ‘I’ll make a blanket for it.’

He pulled her to him then and she giggled like the woman he had first pulled into his bed, ‘One thing’s for sure, you can’t call our child ‘it’,’ he said.

‘I wasn’t calling our child ‘it’, I was calling the crib it.’

He holds her and tries to feel normal; this is normal. It’s what would happen in any marriage and would be a time for joy. But the same twisting fear fills his gut and he grips her perhaps a little too tightly. He’s worried the peace won’t last, he’s worried that their past and history will come crawling up the Ranch’s path, and destroy everything they’ve all worked for. Abigail’s warm hand cups his cheek.

‘Don’t look so worried, John Marston. Things will be good,’

‘I want things to be better this time round,’ he says. She nods, she understands.

‘Then stay with us and look after us,’ she says simply and gives him a kiss.


	2. Birth

He struggles awake when he feels the bed creak and then the door open and close. He rubs his eyes, the grey, pink light of dawn creeping underneath the shutters, and he fumbles around for the watch on the nightstand. Once he flicks it open, he can see the time reads 4.13am. He puts the watch back and gets up. She’d had a rough night, unable to get comfortable, even when she did grab the cushions from the parlour and bundled up her own cape. The cushions are still littered on the floor and at the end of the bed. He scratches the back of his head and walks to the kitchen, where he finds Abigail busying herself with collecting a bucket, a mop, all manner of brushes and cloth.

‘Abby, what you doing, it’s four in the morning?’

She barely registers him, ‘I’ve given up on sleeping and I figured I may as well clean the place up a little…’

‘You’ve got the whole day for that, come back to bed, I’ll rub your shoulders or something…’ he leans heavily against the table and again tries to clear the sleepy dust from his eyes.

‘No, I’ll fix you a coffee,’ she said eagerly, abandoning her bucket, and fishing out the coffee pot from one of the cupboards.

‘Abby, this is madness, come back to bed. Why not read one of your books, if you really can’t sleep? Hell, I can’t have you scrubbing away, not on hands and knees, when you’re so far along.’

‘It’s fine, I’m fine, the baby’s resting.’ She pats her belly confidently, and having left her coffee pot on the table, he finally takes his chance and grabs her by the elbow to steer her back into the bedroom. ‘Oh John, come on, I’m fine. I’m wide awake,’ she protests, as he finally manages to get her into the room.

‘Well, I’m not. I’ve hired Miss Faversham for a reason, so you don’t have to do this stuff. I don’t much appreciate being woken up early and having to beg my wife back to bed.’

‘I can’t sleep, John…’ she begins, and he nestles up behind her, wrapping his arms around her and cupping her swollen belly with one of his hands.

‘Then just rest with me and the baby, if she’s resting too, then you ought to be as well.’

Abigail sighs, but shifts her weight until she’s comfortable and her hand rests on his own.

He’s almost drifted off again, but Abigail then says, ‘You think it’s a girl? I think it’s a boy, he’s so busy moving around all the time.’

He shrugs, ‘Be nice to have one of each, but I don’t know, you’re prob’ly right.’ He nestles a kiss against her neck and feels her warm sigh of contentedness in his arms. 

Even when he wakes at 6am, Abigail has gone again, but he hopes she at least slept for those two hours. He finds her back in the kitchen, brewing coffee, Uncle and Jack are already seated at the table eating oatmeal. She smiles at him briefly and pours him a cup, but as she sets the pot down, he notices she breathes slowly out of her mouth and then grips the counter. She rubs her back and he comes to her side.

‘You alright?’

‘Mm…’ she doesn’t sound sure. She closes her eyes momentarily and then opens them again, gives him a proper smile this time, ‘I think it will be today.’

‘What will?’ he asks, taking a sip of the coffee.

She rolls her eyes and playfully hits his arm, ‘The baby, I think he’ll be coming today, I’ve been cramping something fierce ever since this morning.’

‘What do you mean?’ John takes a step back, the tone and volume of his voice finally bringing Jack and Uncle’s attention to them.

Abigail again rolls her eyes and turns to the other two, ‘I think the baby’s on the way. Jack when you’re done with breakfast, could you run into town and ask the Doctor to pay us a visit?’

‘Um… sure, ma. You don’t want me to go now?’

‘No, nothing’s going to be happening for a while yet.’

‘Well, you seem to be taking it in your stride,’ Uncle says.

‘We’ll see how I’m feeling in an hour or two, doubt it will last.’ Abigail begins to prepare her own tea and serves John a plate of oatmeal.

‘You sure about this?’ John asked. When Jack was being born, he had found a dozen excuses to leave the camp that day. He knew that Abigail had asked for him at multiple points during that day, and was relieved when Miss Grimshaw had insisted that no men were to come near Abby. Now, he wasn’t going anywhere. 

‘Yeah, I had beginning pangs with Jack for hours, pretty sure this one will be a little faster but it’ll still take a while.’

Jack quickly finishes his oatmeal and rushes off to put on his boots and cap. Uncle says he’ll get started with the farm work and stay out of their way. Abigail sips her tea and looks through a magazine, ‘Getting started with the farm work is the easy part, it’ll be a miracle if he finishes any of it,’ she muses.

‘Are you sure you’re meant to be this way?’ John asks, ‘I thought giving birth meant a whole lot of screamin’ and hollerin’?’ The only times when he had come back to the camp, he had found the whole area echoing with Abigail’s screams of pain. He hadn’t liked hearing her crying and begging Tilly to fetch him, while Miss Grimshaw instructed Tilly to not leave Abigail’s side.

‘I told ya’ll, give it time and I’ll start screaming this house down. Right now, mmph…’ she shifts her weight on the chair and breathes slowly again, ‘It ain’t much to speak of, just discomfort and a real bad ache in my back.’

‘You shouldn’t be lying down?’ 

‘I’d rather not, last time I was lying down birthing Jack the whole day and Grimshaw wouldn’t let me up, I find walking and squatting helps. When the Doctor gets here, he’ll probably insist I lie down throughout too.’

As she clears the plates away though, he sees the first true pangs, and Abigail leaves the plates in the sink, in favour for gripping onto the back of a chair. ‘Oh damn, here we go,’ she mutters, then leans her head against the chair and he can see her bear down. She moans heavily and breathes again. When she looks back up again, she doesn’t have the same confidence or composure. But he’s decided she best take the lead on this, seeing as she’s the expert.

‘Ok, she’s coming a lot quicker than I thought, can you help me to the bedroom?’ Abigail asks.

‘I thought you said it was a boy?’ he grins, holding her up underneath her arms and guiding her to the room.

‘Boy, girl, does it matter? Either way, they’re causing me enough pain…’ she grips the bed post and squats down, ‘This is happening fast, I should have asked Jack to run into town as fast he could.’

‘Miss Faversham should be here soon, and she’s born… what, eight kids? Reckon she’ll be able to help too.’

‘True,’ Abigail gasps and finally manages to pull the cover off the bed, ‘Get me the sheet in the chest, I’m about to make a mess of this bed too!’

He digs it out and then lays it onto the bed, before piling up the pillows and cushions by the headboard and helping Abigail lie down on the bed.

‘Glad I didn’t bother getting dressed,’ she says as she pulls up her nightgown and raises her knees, then bears down again and reaches out desperately for his hand, she grips it tightly and he feels the tension in her body. After the wave of pain is over, she breathes out again, and looks up at him, ‘Still, beats birthing in a wagon!’

She smiles, but he feels that hot wave of shame pour over him, and he tries to look down at her hand. She tugs on his hand slightly and forces him to look at her, ‘None of that, forget it. We’re going to do right by this baby, this is a new start for everyone.’

***

It is just as well they called for the Doctor when they did, and had Miss Faversham helping to hold Abigail’s hand. The baby comes quick, she’s born by 12 o’clock, and the Doctor jokes she’s right on time for tea. It’s not necessarily Miss Faversham’s duty, but she’s more than happy to prepare everyone some food and leaves them to get acquainted, once she’s shown the doctor out. Abigail is smitten, by the way she stares at the baby in her arms, and gently stroking her cheek with one finger. When the baby latches onto her nipple, Abigail lets the baby grip onto her forefinger. He nervously hovers by the bed, it all seemed to happen both so quickly and so slowly. He’s still not quite himself. Abigail glances up at him.

‘Good job, you didn’t run,’ she smiles, and he sits beside her.

‘What happened to the new start stuff?’

Abigail turns back to the baby, ‘You’re still my husband, I can still tease you. Now come and hold us both.’

He slips into the bed behind her, wrapping his arms around her shoulder and then carefully cupping the baby’s head. Her damp, warm skin is slowly beginning to flush pink, and there’s downy curls on her head. He carefully strokes the soft, light hair. He’s honestly amazed it’s there; he didn’t expect a new born babe to have any hair.

‘She meant to be that small?’ he asks eventually.

‘She’s actually pretty big,’ Abigail says, ‘Jack was smaller.’

When Jack had been born into the world, screaming and red and angry, he had barely glanced at the wriggling baby in Abigail’s arms. She hadn’t noticed his short, flippant glance, and he had mostly just taken in the blue blanket. He had made the excuse of leaving them to rest to the others, but it had been several days before he had gone back to the camp.

‘Well given how she’s feeding; think she’ll be bigger than he is now by the end of next week!’

Abigail laughs and presses a kiss against the baby’s forehead, ‘Such a greedy little pig!’

‘Hey, you can’t call her that!’ 

‘Do you want to hold her?’ she asks, slowly turning to face him, the baby still in her arms.

‘I don’t know… I don’t know about that; I don’t have much experience…’

‘Well, no one does at first, dummy. I had to figure out how to hold Jack. Here, you just put your arms like a crib, make sure that elbow supports her head…’ she positions his arms, and then deposits the baby therein. He dare not move as the baby fusses a little and seems to squeeze open her eyes. She’s got her mother’s beautiful, dazzling blue-green eyes. The baby frowns intensely at him, as though furiously surmising him and he’s suddenly struck with familiarity with the blue gaze and the intensity of the look. He snorts with laughter.

‘What?’ demands Abigail.

‘She looks like Arthur did when he was gripin’.’ 

Abigail takes a look at her daughter’s face and then hides a smile, ‘Oh poor thing, she does.’

‘Could call her Arthurina?’ he suggests.

‘No way, I can’t call her that. Even Arthur wouldn't find it flattering!’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to post every week, but as it's already written, and as I have a busy weekend ahead I'm just going to post it today, Saturday and Sunday.


	3. Life

She’s called Martha. It comes at mostly Jack’s suggestion, on hearing the ridiculous name of Arthurina. He initially proposes Guinevere, as she was a Queen married to King Arthur. Abigail thinks Guinevere is a bit much, bit too fancy. Jack says, ‘What about Martha, it rhymes with Arthur at least?’ and the name sticks. Though John still occasionally calls her Arthur, mostly as a joke. When she’s screaming blue murder at two in the morning, he can scoop her up from Abigail’s arms, rock the baby and say, ‘What you gripin’ about now, Arthur?’ 

He expected Jack to be jealous of Martha and he wouldn’t have blamed him neither. Martha secured a place in her father’s heart so readily and easily, the guilt that Jack didn’t always stings him. That the only time he realised he really cared about his son was when he had gone, when someone else had him and he had no sense of whether he was safe or not. But Jack’s easy going, a good lad and loving. He’s happy to pick up her spoon, her toy dog or her blankie, whenever he passes by her highchair, and she has thrown them contemptuously to the floor. She’ll coo and giggle delightfully when he’s rescued them for her, and then promptly throw them once more. Abigail adores her, kissing her soft round cheeks whenever possible and letting the baby lick apple sauce from her fingers. 

***

She’s a terror when she starts walking. He turns his back on her for five minutes, while they’re feeding the chickens, and suddenly she’s halfway across the Ranch. Determinedly going to wherever the hell she’s got in mind. She tries to capture the chicken in her chubby arms to hug them, once managing it and he later finds it in her bed. She does her best to lie and say it was Jack who put it there. He has to stop himself from laughing, as the indignant two-and-a-half-year-old, shakes her head and points accusingly at a bemused Jack. Uncle laughs about that for weeks. She loves the horses best. He does love it whenever they go outside and Martha will excitedly exclaim, ‘Pa’s horse! Pa! Pa! Look! It’s your horse!’ As though he’s never seen Rachel before. He picks her up, and she carefully strokes the horse’s neck, it’s soft nose, and babbles away to the horse, ‘Good horsey, good Rachel!’ though she cannot quite manage ‘Rachel’ and instead says ‘Ray-hel’.

It was one of Abigail’s most ferocious outbursts at him, when he was distracted by Uncle, and Abigail found Martha stubbornly pulling over the mount steps, so she could get on one of the horses. 

‘You need to get her a pony, something small to ride, so she doesn’t try to ride a Shire horse or heaven knows what!’ Abigail says.

‘She’s two years old, Abby, she doesn’t need to be ridin’ horses yet.’

‘Yes, but she sees you and Jack doing so, and wants to be the same.’ 

‘If I get a horse for her now, she’ll have outgrown it by the month after.’

‘Well, either way, you need to put a lock on the fence.’ 

‘Abby, she will crawl under the fence, she will crawl over the fence, she will storm the barn if she has to–’

‘John, I do not want to keep her barred in the house all day. If she goes with you, you need to keep an eye on her.’

‘I do, I will!’


	4. Death

In a way, it’s amazing that it happens on an evening when she isn’t covered in bumps and scrapes, when she doesn’t have chicken feathers and hay in her hair. Perhaps that should have been the clue, perhaps he should have realised that she had been quieter that day. So full of excitement and busy talkin’ and laughin’ usually, maybe he should have found it odd that she fell asleep against his chest on the ride home. She picks at her dinner and says she isn’t hungry, but asks for milk. Then later when Abigail is playing a favourite song of hers on the piano, she suddenly pitches a fit, screaming and crying and bawling. Red faced, snotty, sweaty. Says she hates the song, that it hurts her head. Abigail grabs her daughter’s hand to take her to her room for a thorough telling off and almost drops it as soon as she does. She bends next to Martha who is sobbing and places a hand on her forehead.

‘Lord, Martha, you’re burning something fierce. Come on, let’s get you to bed.’ Abigail picks up Martha and the little girl sobs into her neck.

‘Do you want me to ride to town and fetch the Doctor?’ Jack offers.

Abigail looks undecided, ‘Could just be a fever.’

John makes the decision, ‘Yes, if you could Jack.’

Jack heads out. Martha is put to bed. Later she complains that her head hurts and her neck hurts. Abigail stays by her, mopping her brow, giving her water to sip. 

‘Pa?’ Martha asks.

‘Yes, Marrie?’ 

‘Will we ride Ray-hel tomorrow?’

‘Yes, if you’re feeling better.’

‘Promise?’

‘Promise.’

‘I will feel better.’

By the time the Doctor arrives, she’s had the most awful convulsions and Abigail has cried after each one. He doesn’t know what to do, he feels the same loss, the same panic, the same terror as he did when Jack was missing. But she’s right here, right with them. He can’t bring her back. They won’t be able to get her back, they won’t be able to launch some great rescue and bring her home. Her little hand clutches his tightly and he’s begging any God to not be so unimaginably cruel to take a girl as sweet and as lively and as happy as Martha. The Doctor looks worried when they describe her symptoms.

‘I believe that Martha may have meningitis.’

‘But she’s always been so healthy, how?’ Abigail says.

‘There’s many ways someone can catch it, Mrs Marston.’

‘Is there a cure?’ John snaps.

The Doctor says nothing, just grimaces, and Abigail let’s out a desperate ‘Oh!’ noise.

‘The only thing would be to pray and hope she comes through. I’m very sorry, Mr Marston. There’s not much I can do. Keep bathing her forehead and give her something to drink if she’s not convulsing.’

He wants to fling the Doctor out of the house, tell him to go away and come back once he does have a cure. A better one than just sit by his child and watch a terrible battle unfold. But he bites his tongue instead, and the Doctor looks at them both with some sympathy.

‘I could call on the Priest, on my way back…’ the Doctor begins to say.

‘No. If we need a Priest, we will call for one,’ John says. 

***

He has to leave the house. Abigail’s low, moaning wail is too much for him to bear. It goes on and on forever. She is knelt by Martha’s bed, rocking back and forth, holding herself. Jack sits silently in the parlour, a book in his hand, but he hasn’t turned the page for the entire time. He gazes out of the window, looking lost and confused. Uncle is sat with Rufus on the porch steps, the man barely acknowledges him when he passes, just strokes the dog’s head.

He saddles up Rachel and rides her to the very edge of the Ranch. Then he turns her about, kicks her into a canter, loops back round and makes her jump the fence. He rides far beyond the Ranch, past Tall Trees, finally stopping in a field where the dust of the dessert is inching along the road, and into the yellowy grass. He presses his face into Rachel’s neck, remembering his daughter’s final words, ‘I will feel better’ and they echo in his head a thousand times. 

He roars and screams his anger at the deserted plain. A crow cocks its head at him, as though bemused by the yelling, before flying off into the clear blue sky. Finally, there’s nothing left, he sits on the ground and waits. What he’s waiting for isn’t clear to him. Perhaps to be robbed, for someone to ask if he has anything worth taking and he can tell them he has nothing left. Perhaps he has a vague hope Charles or Sadie will turn up, will mourn with him. Sadie would’ve liked Martha. Perhaps he hopes that even now, he might feel Martha’s small hand on his knee and asking him if she can hold Rachel’s reins on the ride home. But she doesn’t. 

She’s lying in the little grave, under the Beech Tree closest to the horses’ pen. She won’t come back, she won’t ride her own horse, she won’t giggle as Jack and Rufus chase her around the yard, she won’t ask for more apple pie, she won’t steal chickens, she won’t learn to read and spell her name, she won’t kiss Abigail goodnight, she won’t get angry that she is the shortest, she won’t glare at the bean stew she hates, she won’t break Abigail’s favourite cup and hide the pieces underneath the house, she won’t yell out ‘Night nigh, sleep tight, don’ let the beds and bugs bite’, she won’t laugh hysterically at Uncles jokes even though it was clear she didn’t understand them, she won’t say to him ‘Pa, it’s your horse! It’s your horse! It’s Ray-hel!’, she won’t hug him fiercely when he arrives home and will tell him all about her day and what she did with mama, she won’t kiss him on the cheek and then complain of ‘Scritchy scratchiness’, she won’t finish each day with ‘Night, pa. Love you, g’night.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter is a little early, because it's a quiet Sunday. Thank you very much for all the kudos, and for reading my little story.


End file.
